10 min Eggplant stir fry

I love the whole process of cooking a meal, its exciting to see how your dish develops step by step.And the thrill part is that you just cannot predict and know how the dish is gonna to be until the last straw! Cooking is also about patience, you have to give the food its deserved time with whatever you are doing with it. I remember instances when I’ve goofed up recipes by being impatient, now I know better :) And that is why for me cooking on weekdays is more difficult, as I am short of both patience and time. So I always refer my list of tried and tasted ’10 min’ recipes on weekdays! The Eggplant (Baingan) stir fry is one of those, savior recipes. Its hard to believe that some one might hate eggplants, but this dish can tempt even an eggplant hater to change ones mind! This dish requires a few basic ingredients, takes very time to cook and goes so well with rotis, rice, and even with pita or sourdough bread.

Ingredients:

4 baby eggplants

1 small onion (sliced)

2 tspn roasted peanut powder

1 tspn mustard seeds

1/3 tspn turmeric

1 tspn cumin-coriander powder

1 tspn red chili powder

2 tspn oil

salt to taste

1/2 tspn powdered sugar

Directions:

Slice the baby eggplants into long slices and keep them in cold water. You can cut them in long slices or small pieces. I like them in thin long slices, they cook pretty fast.

Heat oil in a wok and add mustard seeds to it. Be careful while the mustard seeds splutter, then add the sliced onions.

While the onions are frying, drain the eggplants and add to the pan and mix well.

Now add the turmeric powder, cumin-coriander powder, red chili powder, salt and sugar. The sugar gives a very slight sweet taste, you can skip this if you wish.Mix properly to coat the eggplants with the spices.

Cover and cook for 4-5 minutes on medium heat till the eggplants are soft. Do not overcook and make the eggplant mushy, they need to be just done but still slightly on the crunchier side.

Now take the eggplants off the heat, mix in the roasted peanut powder and here you go!

I make this roasted peanut powder beforehand and store it, so that you can use it with various curries. You just have to roast the peanuts on the pan for about 10 mins and powder them in a mixer. And store it in an airtight container to use whenever needed.

Garnish the eggplants with coriander and serve with rice, rotis and bread.